Tuesday, November 07, 2017

ViaAsk
a Manager comes a question on professional
attire, a topic near and dear to my heart -- as well as a reminder
that I, too was once in the dark on the subject. The letter-writer is
a new manager whose interns have no idea how to dress for work in
their fashion-conservative office. Part of the answer is
ingenious:

... First and foremost, you can minimize the
number of dress-code conversations you need to have by setting really
clear expectations from the very start, when interns first start
working for you. Don't just give them a copy of your employee handbook
and mention that there's a dress code in there; that's not enough
guidance. Most office dress codes assume a certain knowledge of
professional dress is already in place, so they tend to talk in broad
categories -- like no shorts, no T-shirts, etc. That makes
sense for experienced professionals, when it would actually be
pretty condescending to spell out "no visible underwear." But for
people who are brand new to the work world, broad categories can leave
a ton of room for misinterpretation, which is why your interns
may genuinely not know that cutout tops and visible underwear are
issues. [bold added]

And, a bit later:

You
can make this easier on everyone by presenting it as a subject where
it's completely normal for people to need guidance at the start
of their careers. Frame the initial discussion with something like
this: "This stuff can be tricky to figure out when you're new to
working in an office and it might be very different from dress codes
that you're used to before now, so I'm going to be very detailed
about what is and isn't work-appropriate here." You could even add
something like, "If you're not sure about a particular outfit or
clothing item, please feel free to come talk to me. It might
not always be intuitive, and you shouldn't feel weird about
that." [bold added]

I am old enough that going around practically in
underwear hadn't been normalized yet, so I was in no danger of that --
so I made another faux pas instead, showing this advice to be
spot-on: In my first job after college, there was to be a work-related
social function at the boss's house. Although I asked about what to
wear, I took "casual" to mean that a tee shirt and jeans would be
fine. I would have greatly preferred not to have had embarrassment be
the clue that I needed to recalibrate my conception of what casual
attire was.

What I like about Green's advice here is that
it takes into account the possible unfamiliarity of the audience with
the subject matter, but doesn't saddle anyone with the burden of
omniscience. The boss is to hit on common problem areas, which ought
to take care of many of the problems she has encountered, but leave a
friendly door open for further questions from anyone in
doubt.